


well, people will talk

by gryffsirius



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Alternate Universe - Teachers, Desk Sex, F/F, F/M, Lots of OCs - Freeform, M/M, chemistry teacher peter, coneter, conor and emmeline are twins, conor gets 4/4, dorlene, english teacher lily, english teacher sirius, handjob, history teacher remus, i mean i guess i also have to tag it, jily, maths teacher james, remmie, thank u jarauders uwu, wolfstar
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-04-04
Updated: 2019-04-04
Packaged: 2020-01-04 13:07:49
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 11,718
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18344306
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gryffsirius/pseuds/gryffsirius
Summary: Sirius pauses, watching Peter walk away for a moment before realizing that Remus is looking at him instead.“What?”“Nothing,” Remus replies, then starts to head down the hall again. “Are you coming?”“I don’t know, am I?” Sirius rushes out after a beat, deciding he doesn’t give a fuck.“Maybe so,” Remus says, and Sirius has to physically force himself not to ask Remus to slam him against the wall.“Oh,” he says instead, sweating.-anyway this is a teacher au!!! inspired by a currently running rp that my twitter group the jarauders and i are doing. it was originally supposed to be just a oneshot but i love the way it's going to stay tuned for more content!





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> big big big big BIG shoutout to the jarauders for giving me the inspiration and several ocs for this fic. as you read through this literary masterpiece (lol) there are a few things you should know.
> 
> \- gregor mcdougal is the p.e. teacher and the football coach. he is also my oc and will be featured in my series about the marauders, set in the universe of my other story, 'and how mighty it can be'  
> \- conor vance was invented by fantastic jarauder lex. he's emmeline's (emmie) twin and is a pan king. stay tuned for excellent content from him  
> \- valentina carr is another oc, she's a student in this because she's chaotic and it was a good place for her in this storyline  
> \- we know next to nothing about emmie, so super jarauder chloe basically reinvented her character and gave me a lot to work with
> 
> anyway that's all! hit me up on twitter @gryffsirius if you have any questions or comments! comments and kudos are always appreciated, and i love each and every one of you for taking the time out of your day to read this! i hope you enjoy!!

Halfway into the school year, Sirius comes to the conclusion that he’s in love with Remus Lupin.

He knows he shouldn’t be letting himself get distracted with feelings, considering it’s his first year at the school and he’s always had a sort of personal rule against getting involved with someone he works with, but Sirius finds himself glancing across the hall through the little window in the door during class far more often than he should.

“Hey,” he’d said earlier after knocking lightly on Remus' door and opening it without waiting for a response. “Do you have a whiteboard pen I can use?”

It was Remus' free period, and he was sitting at his desk, looking fantastic, marking essays with a red pen and Sirius had wanted Remus to stab him in the throat with it.

Alright, a bit of an extreme reaction, but he stands by it.

“Did you somehow manage to lose all of them?” Remus had asked dryly. “That’s impressive, I could have sworn I gave you one last week.”

“You know, I only had the one, and I used it so much that it dried out really quickly. I’m very hands-on when it comes to writing on the board.”

“I didn’t think there was any other way to write, you kind of have to use your hands.”

Sirius, caught a bit off guard at the casual way Remus was talking about using hands – sure, the conversation was innocuous enough, but his _tone_ – had sputtered something about how he had to get back to his class, to which Remus had smoothly replied that maybe he shouldn’t leave them unattended so much and tossed him a whiteboard pen. After barely managing to catch it and completely failing to get a handle on the color of his face, Sirius had practically sprinted back into his own classroom and proceeded to spend an hour talking about Macbeth to uninterested teenagers.

He’s still thinking about the way the morning had gone hours later, falling into uncharacteristic silence during lunch in James’ classroom.

“What’s wrong with you?” Peter asks, kicking Sirius lightly under the table.

“Did Remus destroy your confidence again?” Lily says between bites of sandwich.

“ _Lily_ ,” James almost gasps, his tone reproachful. “We can’t talk about that here, he eats lunch with us.”

Lily looks around the classroom in an exaggerated motion. “What? He does? I don’t know about you, James, but I don’t see him here right now.”

“He didn’t destroy my _confidence_ ,” Sirius interjects. “He’s, I don’t know. Hot.”

“So are you, why doesn’t he get all flustered like you do?” James asks.

“It’s because he’s a top,” Peter says nonchalantly.

“How do you know that?”

“Have you seen his hands? You’re lucky he’s not a bottom, Sirius, I don’t know what you’d expect to come of that.”

“Who’s not a bottom?” Remus says from the door, finally making an appearance, and Sirius nearly chokes.

“CONOR VANCE,” James shouts over Sirius' coughing.

“Hmm,” Remus begins, taking the chair between Peter and Lily, “I might have heard something different, who knows.”

“What?” Sirius croaks, eyes watering. He takes a drink of water and then manages, “How would you know about Conor Vance’s sexual preferences?”

“Why did you say it like that?” Peter says under his breath. “You sound like a robot.”

Sirius stops wheezing long enough to glare at Peter but lapses into a coughing fit when he tries to speak again.

“Are you done?” Remus asks, eyebrows raised, once Sirius finishes almost dying.

“I’m dead,” Sirius replies, dropping his head on the table harder than he was intending. “Ow.” James laughs.

“Clearly not, you’re still talking,” Remus says.

“No, I’m definitely dead.”

“Do you need me to resuscitate you?”

“Oooh,” Lily says under her breath, sounding like a fourteen-year-old.

Ignoring her, Sirius turns his head so that he’s looking up at Remus, cheek pressed against the table. “Oh, _absolutely_.”

Remus opens his mouth, a slightly amused expression on his face, when there’s a knock on the door and the moment is lost.

“Hey, sorry to interrupt,” comes a voice from the door. Sirius sits up as McDougal leans in through the slightly opened door, looking like he came directly from the gym. “McGonagall wanted me to make the rounds, apparently there’s an emergency staff meeting today? Dumbledore wants to talk about something.”

“Why didn’t they just send out an email?” Peter asks flatly.

“Pete, you know more than any of us that the chance of us reading an email about an urgent staff meeting while eating lunch and therefore free of responsibility is slim to none.”

“Uh, what the fuck is that supposed to mean? Do elaborate, _Remus_.”

“Why did you say my name like that? You don’t read emails.”

“It takes you three months to remember a single student’s name!”

“Do – do any of you have any questions about the staff meeting, or can I go?” McDougal asks from the door. “I still have to go talk to the science department.”

“Yeah, we’re good, thanks Gregor,” James replies over Remus and Peter’s bickering.

“Cool,” McDougal replies before jogging down the hall, presumably towards the science department.

“ _Gregor_?” Sirius asks. “That’s his name?”

“What’s wrong with it?”

“I don’t know, it’s weird.”

“Your whole family are named after constellations and shit, don’t get cocky.”

Sirius points at James threateningly, both of them trying not to laugh. “You’d better be careful of the road you’re heading down, _Fleamont_.”

Lily kicks everyone out of the classroom (“It isn’t even your room!” Sirius had protested) a few minutes before the bell is supposed to ring, citing that she wants a little bit of time alone with James.

“Do you think they’re gonna fuck?” Peter asks as they walk down the hall. James’ classroom is on the other end of the building from Sirius and Remus' rooms, and Peter’s in a different wing altogether because he has an actual lab, so they have a little bit of a walk ahead of them.

“Probably,” Remus replies casually. “They’ve been together forever and they have fifteen minutes. Time restraints and a forbidden location. Looks like they’re spicing it up.”

“Kinky,” Sirius says.

“Do you think so?” Remus answers, looking straight ahead, and the way his voice sounds makes Sirius want to be choked.

“Yeah,” he replies instead, keeping his tone light. “Love a quickie.”

“Okay, well, I think that’s my cue,” Peter interjects, making a left turn down a different hall so that he can head towards his classroom. “Make good choices, you two.”

Sirius pauses, watching Peter walk away for a moment before realizing that Remus is looking at him instead. “What?”

“Nothing,” Remus replies, then starts to head down the hall again. “Are you coming?”

“I don’t know, am I?” Sirius rushes out after a beat, deciding he doesn’t give a fuck.

“Maybe so,” Remus says, and Sirius has to physically force himself not to ask Remus to slam him against the wall.

“Oh,” he says instead, sweating.

Sirius spends the rest of the afternoon far too distracted to actually teach and decides to maintain the pretense of having the class do work by making them read passages aloud to pass the time. He’s fully aware that the kids hate it and think it’s embarrassing, but to be honest, he has other things to think about at this point.

There’s a knock on his door after his last class is over. “Come in,” Sirius calls, not looking up from his laptop, and the door opens a second later.

“Hey,” Remus' voice says, and Sirius very quickly redirects his attention. “I didn’t know you wore glasses.”

“Oh, just for like, looking at the computer screen, my doctor said I was straining them. My eyes, I mean. Anyway, they make me feel old.”

He might be reading too far into this, but Remus is looking at him in a way that makes his stomach feel tight and fluttery and Sirius wants to kiss him. Remus is laughing a little when he says, “Aren’t you twenty-three?”

“Yeah, I just don’t like them,” Sirius manages. He’s impressed with his own skill at maintaining some level of dignity at this point, when Remus is just there, looking like _that_.

He doesn’t really look any different from how he does every day, he’s consistently tall and curly haired and wearing stupid ties and being Welsh, but Sirius thinks that Remus could show up wearing an outfit made from garbage and he would still want to get absolutely wrecked by him.

“I like them,” Remus replies. “You look good.”

“Thank you.”

“You’re welcome.”

There’s a brief moment of pause, during which Sirius contemplates leaping over his desk and just going for it. He decides against that, instead saying, “Anyway, what did you –” at the exact moment that Remus begins, “So, I was wondering –”

“Yes?” Sirius says after both of them stop.

“You sure you don’t want to go first?” Remus asks.

“I’m sure.”

“I was…wondering if you –” Remus pauses, runs a hand through his hair, then clears his throat and continues. “Do you want to do something? Later. Like, come over or something.”

“Oh,” Sirius says, a little shocked, then realizes that the way he responded with just that single word makes it sound like he doesn’t want to. “Yes,” he adds quickly.

It sounds rushed and desperate and he hates himself.

Remus doesn’t seem to notice Sirius' intense deliberation over his choice of words, instead just smiling immediately and beautifully as soon as he replies, and Sirius is in love with him. “Really?” Remus asks.

“Yeah, I’d love to,” Sirius replies softly. “We could go get something to eat after the staff meeting.”

“Oh, shit, we have to go to that.”

“We’re definitely already late at this point.”

They end up running through the empty halls of the school, reaching the conference room on the other side of the building about eight minutes later than they were supposed to. Peter raises his eyebrows suggestively when the two of them slip into the room, flushed and breathless, Remus pointing out a small table off to the side of the main one.

“Sorry,” Sirius says to the room, whispering to Remus, “What?”

“There’s no space at the big one, come on.”

Everyone’s piled their bags around this table, prepared to leave as soon as Dumbledore decides to free them from this impromptu hell of a meeting. The man himself is rambling about some kind of parents’ night that he wants to do in hopes of fundraising for new lab equipment or something. Sirius isn’t listening; this sounds like it has nothing to do with his department and definitely wasn’t worth calling a staff meeting over but rather than pay attention to Dumbledore’s speech, he’s very focused on the tiny table he’s sharing with Remus and the fact that their knees just touching each other underneath it.

They listen to Dumbledore for approximately two more minutes before Sirius decides to just fucking go for it and, before he can lose his nerve, puts his hand on Remus' thigh.

There’s a notepad on the table to keep up the pretense of them taking notes and paying attention. Sirius writes – nearly illegibly, since he’s had to use his left hand – _ok?_

Remus, fighting a grin, says under his breath, “Yeah, you’re great,” with his eyes still at the front of the room.

Sirius admires his professionalism and decides in turn to be super professional himself, walking his fingers along Remus' leg and pausing with his hand on Remus' belt buckle.

“Bold move, Sirius,” Remus says in a tone that sounds as though he’s commenting on a choice in shirt, not Sirius contemplating how to undo his belt without making any noise.

“Shut up,” Sirius hisses. Remus raises his eyebrows, looking amused.

“Are you telling me what to do?” His tone is smooth and cocky and insufferable, and Sirius wants to suck him off.

“Maybe I am, do you have a problem with it?”

Snape starts coughing loudly at the front of the room and Sirius takes the opportunity to deftly unbuckle Remus' belt, the hacking wheezes disguising the telltale jingle of metal.

“Possibly.” Remus looks down at the table and noticeably sucks in a breath when Sirius puts his hand down the front of his pants, noting with a hint of satisfaction that he’s already half hard.

“And why’s that?”

“I don’t know,” Remus continues, looking up and shifting the way he’s been sitting so that his chin is propped up on his left hand and he looks slightly more attentive. “Maybe because you’re the biggest sub I’ve ever seen.”

“I am _not_ , you hooked up with Emmeline Vance, and because James did too, during uni, I know for a fact that she’s at _least_ on the same level as me.”

“No, she’s a brat, you’re a sub, there’s a differen – _fuck_ ,” Remus replies, stopping mid-explanation to put his hand over his mouth when Sirius wraps a hand around his dick.

“I’m sorry, what was that? What’s the difference?” Sirius asks, a grin on his face as he starts to move his hand and Remus shuts his eyes.

“Maybe,” he says after a beat, visibly trying to maintain composure, “maybe I was wrong.”

“That’s the hottest thing you’ve ever said to me. Wrong about what?”

“Maybe you are a brat.”

Sirius leans in closer and says right into Remus' ear, “Do you want to do something about that later?”

He thinks if they weren’t in the middle of a meeting he would’ve immediately kicked the table away and gotten into Remus' lap when Remus replies, his voice rough, “Fuck, Sirius, of course I do.”

Dumbledore ends the meeting and Sirius immediately takes his hand away, feeling slightly guilty but also relieved that Remus didn’t come, because he would’ve had no idea what to do after that. Remus hastily gets his pants back in a dignified position and they’re forced to sit at the table for a few more minutes as their coworkers come up and retrieve their bags from the vicinity.

Eventually, mostly everyone has left the room and the two of them are still sitting there, neither of them saying anything. After another moment, Remus turns to Sirius and says, “Do you still want to come over?”

Remus has a mouth that looks like it was the star in every wet dream Sirius has ever had, and he wants to get fucked more than he’s wanted to in his entire life.

“Absolutely,” he says, and follows Remus out the door.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> im FINALLY updating lol it's because i literally do not ever write smut so it took me forever to write this ,,, it ended up being over 4k but WHAT ARE YOU GONNA DO anyway this as always goes out to the jarauders love u my main hoes
> 
> twitter - gryffsirius  
> instagram - emmakmarie  
> tumblr - siriusorioff

They walk back to Remus' classroom in silence, and Sirius is very aware of the darkening halls from the setting sun outside and how sometimes Remus' hand brushes against his in a way that seems more intentional than not.

“I have to get my things,” Sirius says when they reach the door, stepping back towards his own classroom. “I’ll be right back, okay?”

“Okay,” Remus replies. “You sound like you think I’m going to disappear.”

“I just –” Sirius tries to think of a tactful way to say it. _I really want you to fuck me? I think you’re brilliant and captivating and I want to spend every minute with you? I think I’m in love with you and I would steal the moon from the sky for you if you asked me to?_ Deciding against all of these, he says instead, “I like you, Remus.”

Remus has a smile like a crescent moon and a spray of freckles across his nose and Sirius wants to kiss every single one of them. “I like you too, Sirius,” he says, and Sirius thinks he doesn’t mean it in the exact same way.

Sirius puts that thought out of his mind though, reaching behind him and opening the door to his classroom, weaving through the tables to get to his desk. He realizes that he left his phone there during the staff meeting and checks his notifications briefly, scrolling through texts.

**jimjams (4:12pm):** hey im bored wanna go confiscate fireworks from kids tonight and set them off in the park

**rat boy (5:47pm):** were u giving remus a handjob during the staff meeting or did Mine Eyes Deceive Me

**rat boy (5:48pm):** guess it rly was a staff meeting huh

**jimjams (5:56pm):** YO PADS pete said ?? u were jerking off remus during the staff meeting ??? more like staff MEATing lol am i right

“Okay, I didn’t think we were that obvious,” Sirius says to himself under his breath, frowning. He shouldn’t be surprised that two of his best friends had noticed that something was going on, considering that between the four of them, they’re consistently trying to catch each other’s attention during moments when they really should be more focused. On top of that, they’ve known each other for long enough at this point that they’re all fairly good at reading the others.

Sirius is contemplating replying and telling Peter and James to fuck off – individually or in a group, he hasn’t decided yet – when he’s distracted by a new message coming in.

**waxing gibbous (6:02pm):** are you coming back or do i have to go get you

Something about the tone of that text from Remus makes prickles of warmth dance up Sirius' spine and up into his throat, and he snatches his bag from his desk and practically runs across the hall.

“I’m here,” he says, not bothering to knock on Remus' door. The light is low, and Remus is leaning against his desk looking like Sirius' deep-seated fantasy of Indiana-Jones-but-in-professor-mode come to life, just taller and lankier and causing a far more visceral reaction in Sirius than Harrison Ford ever has.

“I see that,” Remus replies, and he’s back to talking like an asshole again, his voice all smooth and the corner of his mouth turned up like he knows exactly the kind of effect he has on Sirius. To be fair, Sirius thinks, he’s been fairly transparent about his wild attraction to Remus since they met, so he’s probably _painfully_ aware of that impact. “Took you long enough.”

“Did it? I was gone for two minutes, were you really that lost without me?”

Sirius is standing in front of the desk now, extremely aware of the space between them and how Remus has loosened his tie and undone the top button of his shirt and the way Remus is looking at him like he wants to fucking wreck him.

Remus doesn’t say anything for a moment, he just reaches out and hooks a finger in one of Sirius' belt loops, pulling him forward so that he’s standing between Remus' legs. He stumbles a little as he moves, as he has little control over his steps, and catches himself with his hands on Remus' shoulders. Remus is in a kind of sitting, slouched position, so Sirius, standing straight, is taller than him like this, and the way Remus looks up at him now makes Sirius want to kiss him until neither of them can breathe.

“I thought we were going to yours,” he murmurs instead. They’re the only ones in the room, in the wing, in the building, in the world, maybe, but Sirius feels like he has to keep his voice low, because the things he says now are just for Remus.

“We can still go to mine,” Remus replies in the same tone, and Sirius can’t stop looking at his mouth. Remus' hands are moving, sneaking under the hem of Sirius' far too informal shirt, and Sirius almost gets distracted on a mental tangent about his multiple dress code violations, but Remus hasn’t taken his eyes off of him the entire time, and Sirius wants to kiss him.

“I want to kiss you,” he says suddenly, stupidly.

Remus' hands don’t still, instead his fingers hook into Sirius' waistband and Sirius gets tingles running all over his body. “Then kiss me,” he replies, and Sirius does.

Sirius has kissed a fair amount of people over the course of his life, most of them being people he still sees on a regular basis, so he likes to think he has a bit of experience in that field. He _knows_ he has a fair bit of experience just _thinking_ about Remus' mouth and how it would feel to kiss him and what he would do with his hands and how the rest of the day would go, but none of his stupid, fleeting thoughts compare to what’s happening right now.

Remus may have given Sirius the go ahead to initiate the kiss, but he’s the one who’s completely in control, and Sirius thinks that maybe he was just waiting for Sirius to tell him this is something he _wanted_ before he let himself do anything. But now, now his mouth makes Sirius feel like his body has been filled with helium, like he would float away if Remus didn’t have one hand gripping his hip hard but not hard _enough_ and the other tangled in his hair, pulling a little, and Sirius wants more.

Remus breaks the kiss for a moment, and his voice is low and scratchy and fucking delectable when he says, “Did you shut the door behind you?”

“I don’t remember,” Sirius replies, honestly, and Remus hums a little laugh before letting go of Sirius and standing up to do it himself.

The way the door clicks shut is like a signal to _go_ , and Sirius finds himself rushing forward, meeting Remus as he turns around, almost crashing into him. Sirius has to look up to kiss Remus again, pulling him forward by his tie, and he can feel smiling against his mouth between kisses, locking the door behind him and walking the two of them back towards the desk.

“Sirius,” Remus says once Sirius' legs are backed up against the desk and the only light in the room is from the softly lit globe in the corner. He says the same words as earlier, but this time Sirius can tell that he’s looking for a different answer. “Do you still want to come over?”

Sirius pauses, thinking for one, two, three heartbeats before replying. In the time it’s taken for him to decide what he wants to say, Remus has, incredibly generously, moved on to kissing his neck, pulling off his jacket, working at a spot near the base of his throat that Sirius knows is going to leave a mark. “Not – not right now,” he manages, gasping a little when Remus pulls on his hair, tilting his head back.

“Oh, good,” Remus replies, voice buzzing against Sirius' skin, making his body tingle all over, and his tone is enough to make Sirius want to get fucked even more than he already does. “I was hoping we were on the same page.”

“I’ll be on whatever page you want me to be,” Sirius hears himself say and is vaguely aware that he’ll find the coherence to be embarrassed about that after this is over, but all he’s knows right now is how it makes Remus laugh and kiss him again.

“So you’re only a brat sometimes.”

“Maybe I’m just versatile,” Sirius replies as Remus clears his things off of his desk, and he scoots back so that he’s sitting on the edge instead of leaning.

“Maybe you just like me telling you what to do,” Remus counters. Sirius almost comes just from watching him take off his tie. Remus seems to notice the way Sirius is watching his hands, adding, with a cocky grin on his face that Sirius wants to kiss away, “What do you think?”

It takes Sirius a moment before he responds, purely because he didn’t even register that he’d been asked a question. “I don’t know.”

“What are you thinking about?” Remus asks, kissing Sirius again before removing his shirt for him and immediately proceeding to press kisses to his neck, his chest, his stomach, making his way steadily downwards.

Sirius has a hand in Remus' curls and can barely form an intelligent thought, but somehow gets out, “Your mouth, I like your mouth.”

“Do you,” Remus hums somewhere in the vicinity of Sirius' left hip. It isn’t said like a question. “I wonder why.”

“Shut _up_ ,” Sirius says, trying to make it sound like there’s a bit of heat behind it, but it just comes out in a kind of breathy sigh as Remus tugs down his pants and his hand tightens in Remus' hair.

“‘Shut up’? Do you want me to stop?” Remus asks, and Sirius is hard and can’t stop thinking about Remus' mouth and as much as he wants to make a point, he wants Remus to suck him off even more.

“No, keep going, don’t stop.”

Remus shrugs. “You know, that’s what I thought, I just had to make sure.”

Sirius laughs, but it’s mostly a huffing breath as he says, “God, you’re such a –” just as Remus pulls down his underwear and almost immediately takes him into his mouth.

He was right to have those thoughts and wishes and dreams about Remus' mouth and Sirius pulls harder on Remus' hair, only vaguely cognizant of the fact that this is better than he was expecting, and he was expecting a lot. Remus pauses for a moment, removing his mouth from Sirius' dick with a pop, and asks, “I’m such a what?”

“Nothing,” Sirius replies breathlessly, “nothing, you’re great.”

“Thank you,” Remus says smugly, then returns to his task.

Remus knows how to suck a dick and how to do it well, Sirius is learning, and he finds himself talking about nothing in particular, just nonsense punctuated by a lot of swearing. Remus pauses at one point to stick his tie in Sirius' mouth purely to shut him up, which works for approximately five minutes before Sirius spits it out.

“Remus, fuck, I’m –” he begins, and Remus stops immediately.

“You’re what?”

“I was gonna say I’m gonna come if you don’t stop, but you stopped, so.”

The way Remus looks at him in that moment makes Sirius acutely aware of how he can actually ask Remus to choke him now. “Well, good, because if you had told me that, I would’ve said ‘not yet’,” Remus replies.

“Fuck,” Sirius actually says out loud, like an idiot.

Remus stands up and kisses him before saying, “That’s the general idea.”

“Is it?” Sirius asks, somehow surprised.

“Yeah, hold on.” Remus walks around to the other side of his desk to dig through the drawers.

“Do you just, like, casually have lube and condoms in your desk at work? What the fuck is that about?”

Remus stands up straight, making a face at Sirius. “What, you don’t?”

“I – no! Remus, that isn’t a normal thing to do! How many people are you fucking at work?”

“That isn’t – it’s happened like twice!”

Sirius points at Remus, who looks as though he’s scrambling to form a coherent story. “You know, I don’t believe you, but I’m gonna let it slide.”

“Good timing, because I found it.”

“That bottle is far too empty for you to only have used it _twice_.”

Remus sighs. “Are you going to continue talking about technicalities or are you going to let me fuck you?”

“Oh,” Sirius says, suddenly refocusing. “The latter.”

Remus comes back around the desk and stands in front of Sirius, leaning in as though he’s going to kiss him but stopping just short of actually making contact. “I want to hear you say it.”

“What?” Sirius asks, distracted by Remus' body almost against his, reaching out and starting to unbutton his shirt. “What do you want me to say?”

“Tell me what you want me to do,” Remus says in a hushed voice, and Sirius would do anything for him. “Sirius, tell me what you want.”

As much as Sirius is fully aware of exactly what he wants Remus to do to him because he’s been thinking about it in great detail for several months now, he’s encountered once again the problem that seems to be prevalent every time he’s had sex with anyone over the course of his life, and that’s being unable to articulate it without feeling some sense of embarrassment. Like, logically Sirius knows that he doesn’t have anything to be _embarrassed_ about, but he hates _saying_ it. So he pauses for a moment, not replying, working down the buttons on Remus' shirt before looking up finally.

“I really want you to fuck me,” Sirius rushes out, and Remus kisses him.

It’s softer this time, gentler, Remus' mouth on his like the way summer evenings feel, but like summer evenings, Sirius is very aware of the heat behind Remus' motions as he takes his pants off for him while Sirius struggles to remove Remus' shirt.

“This feels like a shitty teen rom-com where they’re fucking for the first time –” Sirius begins, laughing.

“Shut up,” Remus replies, standing up again and trying valiantly to occupy his mouth.

Sirius pulls away a little, just to finish making his point. “– and they take turns taking off each other’s clothes, isn’t that stupid?”

“The trope or the fact that it sort of happened? Because I hate to break it to you, Sirius, that’s how it usually works. We do check a multitude of those boxes.”

“Hey, we’re neither shitty nor teens.”

“No, but we are fucking for the first time, so there’s that.” Remus pulls away to look at Sirius for a moment, and Sirius' hands pause in the middle of trying – for the second time that day – to unbuckle Remus' belt.

The air is heavy with expectation and the way Remus' voice sounds in that moment makes Sirius falter a little bit, his thumb flicking at the corner of fabric right at the button of Remus' trousers before replying, “That’s only one box.”

Remus takes a moment before saying anything in response, and Sirius thinks he’s going to shoot back a witty and sharp quip about how Sirius is a brat or something, but instead he kisses him and says, “I want you to turn around.”

“Okay,” Sirius says, far too quickly, and attempts to cover it up by adding, “Yes, sir, Mr. Lupin.”

“Fucking hell, Sirius,” Remus replies, his voice coming out almost in a sigh, “you’re gonna be the death of me.”

“So, you like that? Good to know.”

“Of course, I like it,” Remus says in a low voice, gripping Sirius' hips and pulling him forward a little so that he’s off the desk and standing again. “I fucking love it.”

Emboldened by his unexpected success in this field, Sirius leans in closer so that their noses are almost touching and murmurs, “Why don’t you show me how much?”

Remus doesn’t say anything, instead letting his actions speak for him, and god, Sirius is fucking glad that he does. He uses his hold on Sirius' hips to spin him around, a little bit faster than Sirius was expecting, stepping up right behind him and kissing him on the shoulder.

“Is this okay?” Sirius hears Remus say against his shoulder in a hushed voice. “Like, are you sure? I just want to… you know, check.” He sounds a little concerned and nervous and it’s a change from the confident demeanor that he’s been putting on this whole time, and Sirius loves him.

“Yes, it’s okay, Remus, I’ve wanted you to fuck me since we met, I promise, I’m one hundred percent into this.”

Sirius has been fingered many times before. He isn’t going to mince words, he was a bit of a slut at uni. But that shit was mediocre at best compared to this, compared to Remus, compared to his hands and the way he knows how to use them. Sirius was right to have stared at Remus' fingers every day since the beginning of the school year, he was right to think about their potential dexterity when Remus mentioned two weeks ago that he used to play the bass, and he was right to daydream about how quickly and accurately Remus can type while he was wanking the other day. Remus is taking his time and doing everything perfectly and Sirius wants to tell him that he’s fucking phenomenal.

He says, “Oh,” instead, in a voice that sounds like a gasp, like an idiot.

Remus, three fingers in, asks in a tone that indicates he knows exactly what the answer is, “So, how am I doing?”

“Please don’t stop,” Sirius manages.

“I wasn’t planning on it, but thank you for giving me some encouragement. And you’re so polite, wow, what a change of pace from earlier. Isn’t this nice?”

“Yeah, very nice,” Sirius replies, leaning against the desk on his forearms, attempting to maintain some element of composure as Remus completely takes him apart. “You’re doing great, we should do this again sometime.”

“Don’t people normally say that at the end of a date?” Remus asks nonchalantly before leaning down to pepper kisses along Sirius' spine and then put his unoccupied hand in Sirius' hair, pulling gently but firmly so that he has to tilt his head back.

“Is this a date?” Sirius counters as Remus kisses him on the nape of the neck.

“I don’t know, I don’t usually fuck people in my classroom and then consider it equivalent to going out to dinner and getting to know them better over the course of an hour.”

“We could do both.”

Remus just hums a little in response. Sirius thinks it sounds like there’s an undercurrent of amusement in it, but he can’t quite tell.

“Sirius.”

“Remus.”

“Can I –” Remus pauses everything for a moment, stops everything, removes his fingers and stills the motions of his hands and Sirius thinks he’s on the verge of death from suspense and anticipation in the time it takes for Remus to say anything else. “Can I fuck you now?”

Sirius turns his head to look at Remus over his shoulder, which is slightly difficult due to Remus' fingers still tangled in his hair. The room is darkened but the glowing light from the globe in the corner is at just the right angle to illuminate Remus' features, and Sirius can just barely see a sprinkling of freckles across his chest and he wants to kiss every single one of them, he wants to kiss Remus again, he wants Remus to fuck him so badly that he isn’t sure how his body is still functioning right now. Remus is waiting for an answer and he lets his hand loosen in Sirius' hair, trailing down to rest on his back, his thumb making a little stroking motion on Sirius' shoulder blade.

“I thought you’d never ask,” Sirius replies, finally, and Remus' smile has all the brilliance of every star in the night sky.

Remus kisses him again, kisses him like he doesn’t ever want to do anything else, like everything else in the world has fallen away. It’s a terrible angle for Sirius' neck and he can only see so much at this point, but he immediately focuses when he realizes that Remus is finally taking off the rest of his clothes, revealing a dick that’s honestly a bit larger than Sirius was expecting.

“Nice,” he says, raising his eyebrows and nodding at it.

“Shut up.”

“I meant it! I said it was nice!”

Sirius has turned back halfway to face Remus at this point, purely for the sake of kissing him at a better angle, which he does as Remus does his best to multitask, though he seems to be struggling to both kiss Sirius back and put on a condom. “Do you need help?” Sirius asks, breaking the kiss.

“I can do it, just give me a second, fuck.” True to his word, Remus gets his shit together almost immediately afterwards and kisses Sirius quickly before, with a degree of roughness that Sirius fucking _loves_ , moving him back into the over-the-desk position he’d been in before.

“Ooh,” Sirius says mildly, “you can do that to me any time you want to, Remus.”

“I just might,” Remus replies. He pauses, and Sirius knows he wants to ask something. “Sirius, can I, like –”

“Yes, go, Remus, please,” Sirius rushes out, and he knows he sounds desperate and impatient, but at this point he really couldn’t care less. The anticipation is burning a hole through his body, lighting his limbs on fire and making him feel like he’s about to fucking ignite.

That’s just a fancy way of saying he’s so turned on he can barely move and he wants Remus to fuck him more than he’s wanted anything in his entire life, but that’s beside the point.

Remus obliges, and he’s so gentle and so slow at first that it’s almost agonizing. Sirius understands the reasoning behind that, but he’s wanted Remus to destroy him for so long that he’s just about ready to literally die for the dick.

“Remus,” Sirius says when Remus is almost completely inside of him, his hands pressed flat against the desk.

“Yes, are you okay?” Remus asks from the vicinity of Sirius' left shoulder, his voice soft, as though he wants to make sure Sirius is completely on board with everything before proceeding any further and that for some reason, his voice is a big part of that.

“Yeah,” Sirius replies, hating how his voice comes out in a bit of a squeak. “Can you, like, move, please?”

Again, Sirius was a slut at uni. This is nowhere near the first time he’s been fucked and it will absolutely not be the last. But Remus moves in a way that makes Sirius see stars from the first rock of his hips, and Sirius has to consciously keep it together so that he doesn’t come with a mortifying speed when Remus and his spectacular dick have just gotten started. However, _were_ he to come with a mortifying speed, Sirius thinks he would allow himself a free pass on that, considering Remus has been thoroughly wrecking him since they got back from the meeting.

Remus is talking, but Sirius doesn’t know what he’s saying, just that his voice is low and rough and Sirius wants him to choke him. He must have said something to that effect, because one of Remus' hands is almost immediately at the base of his throat, applying pressure in just the right way, and Sirius loses all semblance of coherency.

“Fuck,” he says at one point, and something about his voice must have indicated how good of a job Remus is doing, because he laughs at that. “Fuck you, don’t laugh.”

“Fuck me? Isn’t it the other way around?”

All Sirius manages to get out is a flimsy, “Shhh,” reaching backwards in an attempt to lightly hit Remus somewhere – his face, maybe? He ends up just accidentally gently stroking Remus' hair a little bit, deciding not to move his hand away and in fact tighten his grip when approximately one second later, Remus makes the executive decision to start jerking Sirius off with his free hand.

It’s a surprisingly short amount of that and a slight angle adjustment that makes everything just _click_ and Sirius' hand in Remus' hair tightens, and he’s letting out a medley of embarrassing noises and _fuck_ and _Remus_ and Remus' mouth is on the side of his neck. He comes about thirty seconds later, shaking like he’s seventeen and having sex for the first time again, the sensation flooding his limbs and making his arm that’s been holding him up on the desk slip, so he falls forward slightly and has to catch himself on his elbow.

“Fuck,” Sirius says again, this time under his breath, and as though it’s a combination of making Sirius come and seeing him react in that way, Remus is coming a few seconds later, his mouth hot against Sirius' neck and his hands, having moved to less erogenous zones, tightening their grips on his waist and one of his arms.

They separate, not saying anything for a minute or two, just taking some time to reset and clean themselves and Remus' desk up. By the time they’re both dressed again, Sirius has come to the conclusion that he doesn’t know what the fuck he wants to say to Remus.

“Well,” Remus says, picking up his tie from where Sirius had spat it out earlier and seeming to be making a decision where the conversation goes next for both of them, “that was fun.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> lol remus is so unattached btw we are letting remus live his slut life in this one he is doing Great and we are proud of him but its also bc he has a # fear of commitment so if you think he's pretty much doing the verbal equivalent of leaving sirius on read, YOU'D BE CORRECT!!! thank you for reading i love u all <3


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> okay i know it's been 50 years but my friends peer pressured me into continuing this so. here's a new chapter thanks for being patient love u xx
> 
> twitter - gryfffsirius  
> instagram - emmakmarie  
> tumblr - siriusorioff

“‘That was fun’?” Peter asks incredulously the next morning, coffee in hand and eyebrows raised so high that they look like they’re about to disappear into his hair. “Oh, fuck, Sirius.” 

Sirius knows what he’s getting at, but he says, “What?” in a somewhat deceptively innocent voice. 

“ _What_? You  _know_  what, Sirius, you know what he meant by that!” 

“Look, just because he said that doesn’t mean –” Sirius is interrupted by the door to Peter’s lab opening and Conor Vance sticking his head in. “Oh, hey, Conor.” 

“Oh,  _great,_ back me up on this, Vance,” Peter interrupts before either Conor or Sirius have a chance to say anything. “You fucked Remus, you’re an authority on this.” 

“I – does _everyone_  know about this?” Conor asks, frowning. “Yeah, we had a short thing last year, what about it?” 

Sirius rolls his eyes. “Apparently, Pete thinks it’s a bad sign that Remus said ‘that was fun’ when we were done.” 

Conor sucks in a breath through his teeth, bridging it into the first word of his response, “ _Yeah_ , don’t expect him to take you out on a date.” 

“Why the fuck not? I’m beautiful, I’m intelligent, I’m ambidextrous, and dammit, I can make a stellar soufflé.” 

“Ambidextrous?” Conor says. “Last I checked, you could barely write with your left hand, it looks like a five-year-old’s handwriting when you do it.” 

“I’m – I’m ambidextrous with other things besides writing, okay, Conor,  _god._ ”

“And stellar? Your soufflé?” Peter asks under his breath. “Really? Who told you that, your mum? She adores you.” 

“Shut up, Pete, James said it was nice, too.  _Anyway_ , I have a multitude of skills and talents that he would be able to learn about over a nice dinner and then a night back at mine, so what’s the issue? I’m not seeing one.” 

“Uh, he has  _major_  commitment problems, that’s something,” Conor says, then he and Peter both immediately salute and say, “Major Commitment Problems,” before launching into an animated conversation about  _How I Met Your Mother._

“Who wouldn’t want to commit to me?” Sirius says under his breath several hours later, bouncing a dry erase marker between the thumb and forefinger of his right hand. “I’m a catch, has he seen me?” 

“Uh, sir, did you say something?” one of his students says from the front row, looking as though she very much regrets her choice of desk today. Sirius realizes that there’s a strong chance he’s been grumbling under his breath for ten minutes at least.  

“No,” he replies, a tad more sharply than was really necessary. “Eyes on your paper, Miss Carr.” 

Sirius hates the position his classroom is in. He hates that his desk is at the front of the room, he hates that he keeps turning his head to look out of the little window on the door, he hates that Remus keeps doing it too, he hates that they’ve made eye contact at least three times and that Remus consistently gives him a stupid smirk whenever it happens. He hates even more that under the pretense of stepping out into the hall to take a quick phone call – Sirius assumes it was a pretense, there’s no way Remus would have a phone call that short and not say anything the entire time – Remus looked at him directly through the window and mimed sucking a dick, making the corresponding motion with his tongue in his cheek and everything. 

More than anything else, though, Sirius hates that he wants to fuck him again.  

“Hey,” Remus says in the hall after the bell rings and they have an hour for lunch. “So how was the rest of your night?” 

Logically, Sirius doesn’t have any  _real_ reason to think that Remus wouldn’t be interested in pursuing anything further with him, just Conor’s endorsement and all those times that Remus wouldn’t give him a real answer when Sirius had asked him something along those lines last night and… Oh, he’s just now realizing that Remus asked him yesterday if he wanted to  _do something_ , which is vastly different from  _go out to dinner._  

“It was fine,” Sirius replies, shutting his classroom door and starting to walk in the direction of James’ room without waiting to see if Remus was following. “Yours?” 

“It was good,” Remus says in the same tone, easily keeping pace with Sirius’ quick walk because of his hellishly long legs. He catches up close enough to Sirius to murmur in his ear, “I was thinking about you.” 

Sirius will admit it, he gets a tingle up his spine at that, but refocuses almost immediately, doing his best to maintain composure. “We’re at work.” 

“That wasn’t a deterrent last time.” 

“Yeah, well, last time it wasn’t the middle of the day.” That’s a flimsy excuse and Sirius knows it, but all he gets in response is a light snort of laughter from Remus. 

Sirius is silent for a moment, thinking about the reasons why he should keep his mouth shut. He runs through the list briefly – he’s been known to make questionable decisions before, Remus clearly just wants to fuck, that thing that Conor said that Sirius can’t remember right now because when he’s around Remus he forgets how to function like a normal adult human – and decides to ignore it. 

“What, specifically, were you thinking about?” he replies finally, and the self-satisfied grin that Remus is wearing makes Sirius want to drag Remus into the nearest supply cupboard 

“I don’t know, I didn’t think you’d want to hear about it. We’re at work,” Remus answers smugly. “It’s the middle of the day.” 

Sirius stops walking, which is an abrupt change from his previous nearly breakneck pace through the halls, and Remus, who was clearly paying more attention to his cocky asshole tone than where he was walking, immediately bumps into Sirius' shoulder with his chest. “Ow.” 

“You’re insufferable. Watch where you’re walking.” 

“Watch where  _I’m_  walking? Sirius, you need brake lights or something, how else am I supposed to know when you’re going to stop?” 

Sirius gestures wildly with his hands, his lunch box swinging around midair as he does. “I don’t know, pay attention?” 

Remus continues not to pay attention to the subject at hand, his eyes instead following the lunch box as it moves through the space between them. “Is that a Star Wars lunch box? Are you eleven?” 

“That could not be further from the point of this conversation.” 

“And what is the point of this conversation?” Remus asks in a low voice. The hall has emptied, the only sounds the distant noises of kids outside and maybe someone running an entire corridor away. Remus steps closer to Sirius, reaching out and pinching the lapel of his jacket between his thumb and forefinger. There’s no point to that, Sirius knows, it’s just to establish physical intimacy, but god, it’s effective. 

Sirius wants Remus to fuck him against a wall – any wall, really, he’s not picky – and he hates himself for the absolute lack of control he has over his life. 

“Did you have something you wanted to discuss?” Remus continues. Sirius doesn’t know how Remus looks good under the shitty fluorescent lights of the halls and how he is somehow able to have Sirius completely captivated just due to the tone of his voice, but he’s an idiot, and he has to do something about this immediately. 

They are miraculously near a disabled toilet with a lock on the door, and Sirius knows it’s in the worst taste possible to suck off your coworker during your lunch break at your job where you’re supposed to be extremely professional and set a good example for literal children, but what the hell, Sirius has never considered himself to be much of a role model anyway. Besides, it’s not like any of them will know about it. 

Approximately fifteen minutes later than could be excused as being a slow walker or having to finish some work, Sirius meekly approaches the door to James’ classroom, Star Wars lunch box in hand. 

“Hey,” he says as he opens the door, extremely aware both of his friends sitting around the usual group of tables and of Remus lingering in the hallway, waiting a few minutes to come in so that it wasn’t extremely fucking obvious that they’d been together. 

“Oh, hey,” James replies in a slightly miffed tone. “Lovely of you to join us, Sirius.” 

Sirius frowns. “What’s wrong with you?” 

“He’s just pissed because you didn’t show up on time,” Lily answers for James, who’d opened his mouth but had been immediately cut off. 

“We work on opposite sides of the building, I never see you anymore,” James adds, pouting dramatically for effect. 

“I see you every day, multiple times a day.” 

“That’s not enough. I want you by my side, day in and day out.” 

“Are we conjoined, or can I move around the room by myself?” 

“God, I hope you aren’t conjoined, because then James has to come along with you when you get fucked by Remus,” Peter just casually drops into the middle of a perfectly  _normal_  conversation, and Sirius glares at him. 

“When you  _what_?” 

“You fucked  _Remus_?” James pretty much shrieks as the door to the classroom opens. 

“You know, that sentence isn’t entirely accurate,” Remus says smoothly, walking in and taking the last chair, right next to Sirius, at the table group. 

“Do  _not_ elaborate,” Sirius hisses. 

“ _Please_  elaborate,” James interrupts, talking over everyone else at the table, who have all been trying unsuccessfully to get a word in edgewise. “I want to hear every single detail about how it happened. Well, maybe not every detail. There are some things better left unsaid.  _However_ , I want to know everything about the inevitably ensuing romantic exploits. We have twenty minutes left on lunch, tell me everything.” 

“Uh –” Sirius begins, super eloquently. 

“I don’t know what there is to tell,” Remus says, glancing over at Sirius briefly before continuing, “seeing as we’ve… I don’t know, messed around? Is there a non-juvenile way to say it? Anyway, it was only twice, and that by no means constitutes a relationship.” 

As much as Sirius was expecting to hear exactly that from Remus, it would’ve been nice to continue living in the illusion of getting to fuck him and exclusively him for the rest of his life because goddammit, that was the best dick he’s ever gotten before. Residual post-coital glow aside, Sirius is readily able to admit that he has  _feelings_  for Remus, feelings that give him a rosy warmth in his chest and make him want to spend time with Remus even doing the most mundane things. He would pick up trash in a park with Remus, that’s how much he wants to be around him. Of course, if Sirius ever said that out loud it would be tantamount to blowing his potential of any and all future dick appointments, much less possibly eventually getting any reciprocation of his feelings. 

He’s getting ahead of himself. Just because Sirius is emotionally attached to even inanimate objects within thirty seconds of seeing them – he deeply cares about the Pixar lamp and he’s not ashamed to talk about that – doesn’t mean he can expect everyone else to react the same way. He has to keep telling himself that. Then he’s sure to keep it in mind and not let the well of love for Remus already overflowing in his chest leak out any further. Right? 

“Twice?” Peter asks, looking surprised for the first time since exposing all of Sirius' goddamn secrets to the group. “You only mentioned once.” 

“I –” Sirius begins. “I didn’t think I needed to go over all the  _intimate_ details.” 

“Why not?” 

“Why _not_? Because it’s  _private_ , James.” 

“Privacy be fucked!” James nearly shouts, smacking a hand against the table. Peter jumps. 

“Isn’t it ‘be damned’?” Remus asks mildly. 

“Whatever,” James replies, waving a hand through the air. “Be damned, be fucked, be whatever. Just tell me what  _fucking_ happened the other time.” 

“You mean, when I sucked him off ten minutes ago or yesterday when I had my hand on his dick during the staff meeting?” Sirius says, tone dry. 

“Oh, you’re right, I'd been counting the hand job as part of the fucking,” Remus says, turning to Sirius. “Kind of a prelude. But since you weren’t does that make our count go up to three?” 

“Three times and you didn’t tell me? Does our friendship mean nothing to you?” James asks in a tone of fake affront, putting a hand on his chest. 

“Look, it all happened within the span of less than twenty-four hours, at this time yesterday we were just lightly flirting, how was I supposed to know that it was going to go anywhere?” 

“Because you’re a whore, Sirius, and you and I both know that. We were flatmates through literally all of uni, do you think I'm not acutely aware of what happens when you lightly flirt with someone?” James demands. 

“What?” Sirius asks in bewilderment. “What happens?” 

James rolls his eyes. “You’re into someone, they’re into you because you’re hot, you lightly flirt for months, during which time you ask me and Pete whether you think you have a shot, all the while endearing them to you because of your consistent self-embarrassment and complete lack of awareness of your aesthetic appeal. Then eventually, after pining for far too long –" 

“I wasn’t _pining_ , and that’s nothing compared to how long you were hung up on Lily before doing anything about her!” 

“– you  _finally_ get something going with them and are totally blown away when you do.” 

“Interesting pattern,” Remus says. “That’s exactly how it went.” 

“Since when do we ‘have something going’?” 

“I don’t know, we’re fucking, does that count?” 

“Can we have a conversation at lunch just  _one_ time lately that doesn’t involve fucking Remus?” Lily asks. “Just one? Please?” 

Sirius frowns. “Who else was talking about it?” 

“You talk about it all the time!” 

“I do not!” 

“You do,” Peter adds, and Lily sort of toasts her sandwich at him in acknowledgment. “You’ve been talking about your huge boner for Remus since the first time you met him.” 

“Have you,” Remus says mildly, a self-satisfied grin on his face. 

“Shut up,” Sirius hisses, stepping on his foot under the table. “I have  _not_ ,” he continues to the group as a whole. “This is slander.” 

“Well, to be fair, one of those conversations was piloted by Conor,” Peter says. 

Remus doesn’t really reply to that, he just raises an eyebrow and stabbing a fork into his plastic container of pasta. The table goes silent for a moment. 

“So,” James says. “What’s everyone doing tonight for the open evening?” 


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> :o we uploading
> 
> twitter - gryfffsirius  
> instagram - emmakmarie  
> tumblr - siriusorioff

School doesn’t feel like school when it’s dark outside. Charlie has been volunteering to be a guide at open evening for the past three years or so, and he still isn’t used to it. 

Another thing he’s never managed to get used to is Mr. Dumbledore’s incredibly weird and long-winded speeches. He's standing off to the side of the hall with the other student guides, waiting for their head teacher to finish speaking so that they can get sent off with families in order to show them around the school, and at this point he’s just ready to get on with it. 

After what seems like an eternity,  _finally_ Mr. Dumbledore finishes speaking and they start to get sent off with families. Charlie had asked his friend Valentina Carr to be a guide with him, so they both step forward when Mrs. McGonagall waves them towards a family: two parents and their ten-year-old son. 

“Hi,” Charlie says, waving to them. “Nice to meet you, I’m Charlie.” 

“I’m Val,” Valentina says, holding out her hand for each member of the family to shake in turn. “We’ll be your guides for today.” 

“They put us together because we’re both gingers.” That joke gets polite laughter. Charlie decides that’s better than nothing. “Just kidding, we’re friends.” 

“Nice to meet you, Charlie, Val,” the dad says, shaking their hands. “I’m Amos Diggory, this is my wife, Catherine, and our son, Cedric.” 

“Are you excited to start secondary school, Cedric?” Charlie asks, looking down at the younger boy. Charlie has approximately three million siblings – he has six, but exaggerating makes it more fun – yet somehow he always seems to forget that ten-year-olds are kind of small. 

Cedric shrugs. Their little group starts to walk out of the hall. 

“I was scared before starting big school too,” Val says easily as they walk. “Don’t worry, it’s not as bad as you think, there’s just more people. But you’ll still be with all your friends from primary school, don’t worry.” 

“What’s your favorite subject?” Charlie asks when they get to the hall. “We can start there.” 

Cedric looks at his dad quickly before saying, “Football.” 

Charlie tries and fails to stifle a small laugh. Luckily, no one seems to notice. “We can go to the pitch later, if you want. I play football, too.” 

“Cool,” Cedric replies, smiling a little. He pauses, then says, “I mean, I guess if I have to pick a  _lesson_  I like best... probably science.” 

“Oh!” Val says, hitting Charlie lightly on the arm. “Let’s go see Mr. Pettigrew. You’ll like him, he’s fun.” 

Mr. Pettigrew’s classroom is, as usual, full of utter chaos. He's flitting around between knots of students and parents, answering questions from both, all the while directing his student helpers in administering the science experiment that he’s getting the younger kids involved in. Charlie remembers this from when he came to his open evening, but that was five years ago, and Mr. Pettigrew is in his mid-twenties, so he wasn’t there then. However, he seems to be taking over the responsibilities with ease. 

Cedric goes forward to join the other kids with soap bubbles in their hands eagerly, after a quick introduction by Val, and a few moments later, Mr. Pettigrew is lighting the soap on fire with a flourish. There's a loud  _oooooh_  from the kids, followed by lots of clapping. 

“Mr. Pettigrew, why didn’t you collab with Mr. Snape?” one of the other guides asks Mr. Pettigrew. Charlie hadn’t noticed until then, but because most of the other teachers work with someone else from their department to put together an activity for open evening, Mr. Pettigrew, on his own, is looking particularly swamped. 

“Oh, because I hate him!” Mr. Pettigrew replies cheerily. 

“Really?” Charlie asks incredulously. 

Mr. Pettigrew snorts. “No, Charlie, I'm kidding. He just had his own plan.” 

They stay in the classroom for a while for Mr. and Mrs. Diggory to ask Mr. Pettigrew some questions and for Cedric to talk to some of the other kids, before eventually moving on. Mr. Pettigrew waves to them as they leave, but doesn’t say much, as he’s already moving on to talk to some more parents. 

“Okay, maths is next. That’s Mr. Potter and Miss Meadowes up there,” Charlie says, pointing. Their classrooms are across the hall from each other, and they have a group of kids working on putting together a large, collaborative puzzle on the floor of the hall. It doesn’t seem to be the most effective idea, as people passing are having to skirt around the edges of the group, but the kids seem to be enjoying it. 

“Hi, Charlie. Hi, Val,” Mr. Potter says when the two of them approach, giving them both a smile. Miss Meadowes seems to be involved in helping the students with the puzzle, but Mr. Potter turns to greet the Diggorys. “I’m James Potter, maths teacher, nice to meet you. That's my colleague, Dorcas Meadowes.” 

Cedric goes and works on the puzzle with the other kids for a bit and then it’s time to move on. “Is Mr. Potter nice?” he asks as they walk down the hall. 

“Oh, yeah, he’s great. He's kind of weird, though. If you forget a pencil or something he makes you give him your shoe until you give it back.” 

“He’s also been dating Miss Evans  _forever_ , there’s a bet going on how long it’ll be until they get engaged,” Val adds. “They went to uni together or something. I think Mr. Black went with them too.” 

“A lot of young teachers at this school,” Mr. Diggory comments. 

“I think it’s good for connecting with the youth,” Charlie replies. He doesn’t know why he sounds like he’s an advert for Waddingham Academy just now, but it seems to work on Mr. Diggory. “We just became an academy, too, so that’s good.” 

They make idle talk, passing through and seeing Mr. Vance in drama and Mr. McGregor in P.E. Cedric asks about football and Mr. McGregor mentions that he and Mr. Potter coach the team together, and Cedric seems to be excited about that. 

Eventually, they make their way to the other side of the building. “So next is history and geography,” Val says, and out of the corner of his eye, Charlie thinks her cheeks might be a little pink. 

“Are you blushing?” he asks in a low, slightly teasing voice. “What, do you have a crush on Miss McKinnon?” 

“ _No_ ,” Val replies quickly. They're walking slightly ahead of the Diggorys, and she looks backwards to make sure none of them have noticed what she and Charlie have been talking about. “Just – Mr. Lupin is. Nice.” 

“ _Nice_?” Charlie asks incredulously. “He isn’t nice!” 

“Who isn’t nice?” Cedric calls, sounding a little worried. 

“Oh, Mr. Dumbledore,” Val replies easily, glaring pointedly at Charlie. “We were saying that he’s kind of weird, so that outweighs his niceness.” 

“Oh,” Cedric says. They reach the classroom, where Miss McKinnon and Mr. Lupin are in the middle of getting groups of students to try and organize the best possible battle strategy on a field with a bunch of figurines, replicating something from World War I, Charlie is guessing. 

“Hello!” Miss McKinnon calls when they walk through the door. “Come join my team, it’s clearly superior.” 

“No, don’t listen to her, we have less people on our side, come over here,” Mr. Lupin interrupts, stepping forward. “I’m Mr. Lupin, what’s your name?” 

“Cedric.” 

“Cedric, hi, nice to meet you. Miss McKinnon has three more people on her side than we do, and since we’re formulating strategies, don’t you think that adding more people to our side would help us win against her?” 

“Ignore him, Cedric, he’s Welsh and a liar and  _because_ we have more people, that’s why this is the  _winning side_!” Miss McKinnon all but shouts the last words. Mr. Lupin waves off her statement. 

“Your decision, Cedric,” Mr. Lupin says, shrugging and walking back to his side of the classroom. 

Cedric's sympathy for the losing side seems to win out, and he follows Mr. Lupin back to where he’d gone. 

Charlie and Val stand against the wall of the classroom, waiting for the students to finish positioning their armies and for Mr. Lupin and Miss McKinnon to finish roasting them for their choices. 

“So,” Charlie says in that same teasing tone as earlier. “You have a crush on Mr. Lupin.” 

“I do  _not_ ,” Val hisses. 

“It’s okay, Mr. Black does too.” 

“What? No, he doesn’t, Mr. Black isn’t gay.” 

Charlie snorts. “Uh, yeah, okay, Val. Sure. Mr. Black isn’t gay.” 

Val looks off to the side incredulously and then back at Charlie. “Okay, Charlie, what’s your evidence?” 

Charlie shrugs. “I don’t really have any hard evidence. I just think they like each other.” 

“Okay, Mr. Black  _might_ be gay, but Mr. Lupin  _definitely_  isn’t!” 

“What? Why? Because you want to fuck him?” 

“No, because he dated Mr. Vance’s sister!” 

Charlie throws his hands in the air. “That doesn’t mean he can’t be into Mr. Black, too! I heard he was with Mr. Vance, too, not just his sister!” 

“That’s  _not_ true. What is this, a soap?” 

“I heard that’s why they broke up.” 

“This just in, Charlie Weasley is an expert on all of our teachers’ sex lives,” Val says. Luckily, no one seems to be hearing the conversation that they’re having, given the fact that everyone in the room is intensely focused on the battlefield at the front of the room. “Pray tell, what other secrets do you know that you haven’t deigned to share with me and the rest of our friends yet?” 

Charlie laughs. “Look, Val, I'm just speculating, I don’t know. My brother Bill thinks Mr. Vance and Mr. Pettigrew are into each other. Also, this isn’t a secret, but Miss McKinnon and Miss Meadowes are engaged.” 

“Since  _when_?” 

“Since summer! I saw them kissing in a park once, I was there with my little brothers. Also Miss Meadowes is wearing a ring, and she’s always mentioning her fiancée.” 

“Maybe she’s cheating on her fiancée with Miss McKinnon.” 

Charlie stares at Val for a second. “You’d rather Miss Meadowes was cheating on the person she promised to marry than be engaged to Miss McKinnon?” 

“No!” Val replies hastily. “No, I'm trying to poke holes in your theories. These are pretty far-fetched, Charlie.” 

“They are not. You'll see when we go to English, I'll show you why I think Mr. Black is gay,” Charlie mutters under his breath as the Diggorys approach them. 

“Nice job, Cedric,” Mr. Lupin calls after them as they head out. 

“Bye, sir,” Val says, pink again. 

“Bye,” Mr. Lupin replies absently, already focused on setting the room back up with Miss McKinnon. 

“Smooth,” Charlie says as they leave the classroom. 

“Shut up.” 

They only have to head across the room to English, where Mr. Black and Miss Evans have set up what seems to be some kind of murder mystery based on the adventures of Sherlock Holmes. 

“Welcome!” Mr. Black says, throwing the door open with a flourish as they approach. 

“This is Mr. Black, he’s mine and Charlie’s teacher this year,” Val says. 

“Hi,” Mr. Black says, introducing himself to the Diggorys. “Come on in, Miss Evans is in here – Lily, someone finally made it to our side of the school!” 

“Wow, we’ve been waiting all night for this!” Miss Evans’ voice says from inside the classroom. 

Their little group follows Mr. Black inside. “I’m kidding, we’re just in a lull,” Mr. Black says, and it sounds like he’s trying not to laugh. He sounds like that a lot. Charlie is never sure why. 

Charlie and Val stand against the wall like they did in history, this time watching Mr. Black and Miss Evans task Cedric with finding clues to figure out how the tape-outlined body shape on the floor ended up in that predicament, all the while answering questions from Cedric’s parents. 

“He drives a motorbike,” Val says under her breath. The room is distinctly quieter than Mr. Lupin's classroom had been, so they’ve lowered their voices. 

“What, gay people can’t have motorbikes? His theatricality alone is an indication.” 

“Okay, way to categorize him by stereotypes.” 

“Look, Val, honestly, it’s the way he acts around Mr. Lupin, so we won’t know until we see them together.” 

They're up by the front of the classroom, leaning against the whiteboard by Mr. Black’s desk. There's a picture on it of him and Mr. Potter, presumably in uni, and a small plant sitting on the corner with a note sticking out of the pot on a stick saying _water me!_ in Mr. Pettigrew’s handwriting. Cedric has drifted to the other side of the classroom with Miss Evans, and Mr. Black, after answering a few of the Diggorys’ questions, has started setting things back into their starting positions after they’ve been interacted with. 

“Hey,” comes a voice from the door. Charlie looks around to see Mr. Lupin sticking his head in. “Sirius.” 

Mr. Black turns at that, looking up from his cross-legged position on the floor. “Oh. Hey, Remus.” 

“Hey,” Mr. Lupin repeats, walking in the classroom. He glances at Val and Charlie, clears his throat, then says, “So, Marlene and I decided to get drinks, I think everyone’s coming, do you want to?” 

“Who’s everyone?” 

Mr. Lupin shrugs. “Everyone we like?” 

“Aw, you like me?” 

“Shut up, I'm making the rounds. Are you coming?” 

“Yeah, of course,” Mr. Black replies. “I’ll ask Lily for you, but if James is going I'd assume she is, too.” 

“James is always going.” 

“Then so is Lily.” 

“Cool,” Mr. Lupin says, knocking his knuckles against a desk. “So I'll see you after?” 

“Yeah, see you,” Mr. Black replies, giving Mr. Lupin a little smile. “Go back to your class, I'm sure Marlene is killing your side of the army without you there to direct the kids.” Mr. Lupin laughs and walks out. 

Neither Charlie nor Val say anything for a moment. A rather big knot of new students come in and Mr. Black is immediately occupied with them. 

Finally, Charlie turns to Val. “What did I tell you. What did I  _fucking_  tell you?” 

“They’re going to drinks with a bunch of their friends, that doesn’t mean anything.” 

“He could’ve sent out a group text. But he came and asked Mr. Black in _person_. I  _told_ you they like each other.” 

“Jesus, what kind of drugs did you _take_  before this, Charlie? They aren’t fucking! I'm willing to bet on it.” 

Charlie looks back at Mr. Black, in the middle of talking kids through the mystery they have to figure out. He might be imagining it, but he thinks he sees Mr. Black glance towards the door, in a direction that could be approximated as across the hall, towards Mr. Lupin’s classroom. It's a motion that Charlie’s seen many times before, in their lessons.  

Charlie knows he’s right. 

“How much?” 


End file.
